NELLIE left her home on a December morning for school, happy and gay, giving her mother her usual kiss.
“Do not go on the ice,
Nellie dear, it is not safe,” were her mother’s words, as she ran down the avenue after her child, warning her of a danger she feared might tempt her by the way. Nellie waved her hand and nodded her head, then started off again over the crisp snow. By the side of the road there was a lake, and as Nellie came up alongside of it, she saw several school-girls sliding on the ice.
“Come on Nell,” shouted one, but Nellie remembering her mother’s words shook her head.
“Ha, you’re afraid the ice will break,” shouted the other, “poor little coward: if it bears us, it will bear you.”
This was the tempter’s voice, and if Nellie had been wise, she would have taken no notice: but foolish girl, she leaped over the fence and jumped on the ice, to show them she was no coward, and thought herself very brave no doubt. But her triumph was only for a moment or two; disobedience does not go unpunished, and while Nellie was showing her bravery by sliding along in front of her schoolmates, she did not observe a crack in the ice until she plunged into the water. Her shrill cry brought three men from an adjoining field, who with difficulty got her out, dripping wet, shivering with cold. She was wrapped in a coat and carried home, much ashamed.
Nellie never forgot that morning’s disobedience: she learned how unsafe it is to listen to the tempter’s voice, and now saved by believing on Christ as her Saviour, she is often warned by the remembrance of that incident of her school clays, not to take one step of the narrow way, into forbidden paths, which, however pleasant, always end in sorrow.
By fair promises, Satan seeks to lead the sinner down to death and hell. Beware reader, lest he lead you there,
ML 12/12/1937